Roy Williams Monday Quotes

Well, it's been a long regular season in the conference. We felt very fortunate to win yesterday. It was really a very good basketball game with two very good teams. We had lost at Georgia Tech during the week, and we were able to bounce back and get a win. So it makes Monday morning a little brighter.

Is there a protocol in a lopsided game, which coach removes its starters at the end of the game?

I think that would be a hard answer for any coach. So I guess that means there is no protocol. You have to make a determination of what the score is. If it's lopsided, then you're talking about 25 or 30. The things you guys don't understand…just look back. We were down 23 with just under four minutes to play at Virginia Tech, and we cut it to three. So what may be lopsided to somebody else is not necessarily lopsided to a coach. But if I have to pick, in most scenarios, the team that is ahead would be the one that would take the starters out first. If you take your starters out and the other guy doesn't, then all of a sudden it's closer than you thought it would be. But then again, it goes back to what do you think is lopsided. In today's college game, some leads can evaporate pretty quickly especially with the three-point shot; particularly when Florida State loses to Boston College when a guy is fouled on a three-point shot for a four-point play. So, again, as I said yesterday, I sat in the stands when I was a high school coach and we beat Duke when we were down eight with 17 seconds to play, and there was no three-point play. So, I think somebody else's definition of lopsided would not be the same if they were the coach and had been through some things like that.

On Tyler Hansbrough's condition -

I am confident he'll play [Friday]. Yesterday in the press conference I gave some bad information, because I had a bad source when I said his nose was not broken. The source was Tyler. After the game, I talked to the trainers, and they said, ‘We're not so sure.' He had an X-ray this morning, and it is a small non-displaced fracture in his nose. It's not completely broken…his nose did not have to be set or straightened out. His tooth which happened earlier in the game, they did an X-ray of it this morning, but they're going to have to do another on this afternoon, because it was not definitive. Down the line, he'll probably have to have a root canal on that.

Will he have to wear a mask?

We're going to make a mask for him. I know he's being fitted for one…and I'm going to ask him to wear it the next couple of days, but whether or not we have him wear it in the games – we don't know yet.

Further feelings about the incident -

I know Gerald Henderson and his family, and I think he's a wonderful kid. I don't think there was any intentional thing planned. I think it was an unfortunate thing that happened during the game. It did look like a blow that you hope doesn't happen in a game. The referees looked at it and made there decision, and after looking at it on tape, that is the decision I would have made. But I do believe we also got to understand these are two teams that compete awfully hard against each other and have a great deal of respect for each other. Sometimes things get more physical in a game than we would like it would be. I think the referees made the right decision, and at the same time, I don't think Gerald Henderson is a bad individual. I don't think he sat there on the bench and said, ‘If I get a chance, I'm going to go in and clobber Tyler. I just don't believe that. I wish everybody would let us move on and discuss the basketball game, to be honest with you.

Has the conference said anything -

The way I understand the rule is that there is no appeal, so I don't know what they're saying.

MIKE KRZYZEWSKI

On the incident -

I don't feel so much differently. I feel a little more knowledgeable of the situation. You're not making decisions like you are in a game. Actually, I've looked at it a lot, and as I've looked at it, the one thing that I did not see early on – and I looked at it like three times before the press conference right after the game – is that Gerald's hand is open. So taking him through the sequence of that play, Tyler misses the free throw, gets the rebound, if he's going up and trying to score, he's actually fouled by Steve Johnson as he's somewhere on the ground and going up. However by that time, Gerald Henderson has left the floor. Gerald's intent is to try to stop him from scoring at the basket. So his hand is open and he's ready to go up, however the ball never goes up there. He never extends his arm. You see him turning, and you actually see him close his eyes, and he hits Tyler. If it was intentional, he would have come with…probably, his hand would have been closed, and he would have met him head on.

So to me that's what happened. It's unfortunate that kid got hurt, and all the blood and all that. That's the way I see it. If I thought that he did that intentionally, I would suspend him for longer than a game.

Did the referees do a good job?

Yes (pause) I think they did a good job. There's a lot going on in a short period of time – the blood, the crowd. I'm not blaming anybody, but it's just unfortunate, and the person it's most unfortunate for is ‘G;' because, that wasn't his intent and that's not what he was doing during that play. I believe that with all my heart, head, and whatever.

The main thing is for Gerald's reputation. He's not that kind of a player.

How many games did you suspend Christian Laettner for when he stomped on the Kentucky player? (Gregg Doyel, CBS Sportsline)

First of all, would you call that a stomp?

Absolutely, I've seen it over and over.

Well then my judgment and yours differ.

I've got some glasses. Are you serious?

I'm not going to get into it with you, because you would always want something controversial.

I would just like the truth sometimes, that is all.

No, believe me. There's nobody that likes the truth more than me. After the season we'll talk about 1992. I would rather talk about 2007 right now.